“Matthew and the Parthenon,” 2018, pencil on velvet paper, 23 x 23 cm (9.1 x 9.1 in)
What do you think Valentine’s Day is about? Many celebrate February 14th without knowing its origins in early Christian martyrdom and beyond. We like this gift-exchanging ritual and public expression of love on this day because it reveals our more profound need to be “in love.”
This need has always been with us. In the Greek language, there are two different words for love: agape and eros. Agape is more profound and stable, and eros is the condition of being in love. The etymology of the word eros means to desire, to want, and it has more dynamic qualities than the passive agape word. In fact, in Hesiod’s Theogony— a poetic text that describes the genesis of the Greek gods — Eros is the last of the four self-created principles, the other three being Chaos, Earth, and Tartarus (a sort of cosmic pit) that produce everything. According to Hesiod, Eros is a primordial cosmic force that forms various celestial bodies and keeps everything whole by binding together the congeneric elements of matter. In other words, eros-love is what keeps us going. Moreover, the Pre-Socratic philosopher Parmenides agrees with this view in Fragment 13 – As first, indeed, eros, of all the gods, (she) was devised.
If we think of love like the Pre-Socratic philosophers—i.e., as the impetus towards life—then Valentine’s day, a fortnight before the beginning of Spring, is the ritual for the Joy of Life. How about having Valentine’s Day as a day of falling in love not only with one person but with humanity itself? Isn’t it already proof of our soul’s desire to materialize that we are alive and breathing on this beautiful planet?
Every year, on February 14th, let’s remind ourselves to celebrate our yearning to live and to love other people, animals, nature, and the entire cosmos.
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